My friends send me a USB drive which has been encrypted with a password in Windows 10 before. There are many important photos for our travel. But when I inserted it on my MacBook. It gave me the windows that the disk was not readable by this computer. I have the password and can not access the drive to get what I want!! Bad mood.

Can anyone give me suggestions? I search online and found there is a tool called iSunshare BitLocker Genius. Did anyone use it before? I know nothing about computer, just want the simplest way to get the photos and share the happy times with my family. Help!

4 Answers
4

If you have the password, and you know that the drive works in Windows, then I think the simplest way would be to borrow a computer with Windows and copy the files off the drive to another drive that you can use with your Mac. Alternatively, get a copy of Windows and run on your Mac with VirtualBox, VMWare, etc.., should be able to copy the files to your host Mac system with shared directory or something. It looks like you can download a Windows ISO here, which you would use to create the virtual machine on your Mac, not sure if you need a registration key just to install and load the OS, in my past experiences you've been able to get to the desktop without registering.

I asked my colleagues and they did not use Windows laptop. I don't know why. I get used to Mac. But what you said seems to be complex. Could you tell me what is VirtualBox?
– Elina WuFeb 22 at 10:02

virtualbox.org Virtual Box is a virtual machine client, frequently used to run another operating system inside your current system. So you can use it to run Windows inside your Mac. Its not a perfect solution for all things, and it takes some configuration, but it can likely accomplish this. You will need to install VirtualBox, and you will need a copy of a Windows ISO like the one in the other link I posted, for it to work.
– user5359531Feb 23 at 0:45

To the best of my knowledge neither Apple nor Microsoft offer a way to read a Bitlocker encrypted drive on macOS.

A little searching turned up a utility called "M3" from a company called M3 Data Recovery that purports to enable Macs to read Bitlocker encrypted drives.

Note that I have ZERO experience or knowledge of this utility, how good it is, how well it works, or anything else. So use it at your own risk.

Personally I'd just ask whoever sent you the encrypted drive to just put the files on an unencrypted drive. Or give them an ExFAT formatted USB key of sufficient size and ask them to put the files there.

Thanks, My friend and I are in different cities. So considering the safety of the data, he protected it with BitLocker password. I think it is right, after all, no one knows what will happen during the express delivery. I checked M3 data recovery, the price is higher than what I mentioned tool. I need to think twice and compared more.
– Elina WuFeb 22 at 0:51

You could have him put the files in an encrypted zip file. There are utilities on the mac that will open those...
– Steve ChambersFeb 22 at 0:52

You are brilliant! It is a pity that he did not do that before. I think he did not think more and just keep doing the encryption as he did always.
– Elina WuFeb 22 at 1:21

By default, we couldn't open, read and write a BitLocker drive on Mac. But take it easy, the BitLocker Genius tool is a really simple and user-friendly tool that can help you get access to the BitLocker drive without any data loss.

When you meet "The disk you inserted was not readable by this computer" error, you can click on Ignore button. I'm also a user that know little about computer. But I insert the drive to Mac and type my password then that drive is able to work normally.

Besides, you can unlock the BitLocker encrypted drive on Mac using a recovery key as well.

Will it make any changes to my photos? The photos are important to me!
– Elina WuFeb 22 at 1:32

Don't worry, it won't take any damage to your files including photos on this drive.
– Erish carsorFeb 22 at 1:39

Thanks. I tried iSunshare BitLocker Genius and got all the photos to transfer on my Mac. As you said, It is simple and with no data loss. I guess what if the software can help me turn off BitLocker encryption on Mac, it would be better. Now I only have to format it.
– Elina WuFeb 26 at 7:11

Have you resolved your question? Normally, you cannot access a drive encrypted with Windows BitLocker on Mac OS X because Mac OS X doesn’t support BitLocker. To access a BitLocker drive on Mac OS X, you have to firstly connect the drive to a Windows computer and then simply go to Control Panel > System and Security > BitLocker Drive Encryption to turn off BitLocker encryption on this drive. If you cannot find any Windows machine, you have to use a third-party utility to access the BitLocker drive on Mac OS X. I found this utility called BitLocker Reader for Mac at Google. You can give it a try. Good luck.